CruisingNewb

TOTALLY FORGOT THAT HAPPENED! YESSSS!!!!

If you have the refreshment or deluxe packages, everytime you go to a bar for drinks, ask for 2 bottles of water. Take them back to your room and place in the cooler/"fridge". Repeat. Boom, surplus of water and plastic. True vacation.

The Pork Belly strip, or "Bacon" as it is called at Chops, seemed like they tried too hard and kinda failed. Too much going on and too little technical effort. I would let the pork belly speak for itself with minimal seasoning (salt and pepper), while focusing more on technique and preparation. Personally, I would quick smoke it, slow oven cook, then sear on a flat top of torch the hind/fat for crispy texture. The world famous Peter Luger Steakhouse has a pork belly strip. It is simple in its preparation and seasoning. Very tasty. Chops, not so much. It is a hard pass for me.

I believe Moses tried to fit it onto the tablets but there wasn't enough space.

It is a cardinal rule that if you are an adult, the number one, first and foremost, most important, absolutely necessary thing to do once you board is order a drink!

https://www.royalcaribbean.com/faq/questions/drinking-water-onboard-regulation#:~:text=Yes. All drinking water is either distilled from,construction and throughout the year%2C to ensure compliance. 100% agree.

Or you can visit a port of destination, go to a local store and get bottled water for half the price.

I am truly sorry that you had to go through these things. My comments were for the advancement of this forum and to offer perspective for future cruisers and new members. I didn't mean to diminish your feelings and experience. 1. This is the one statement that I cannot understand though. TA's are busy. I get that. But TA's are supposed to be busy. Its their job. They get commissions. The whole point of a TA is to act as your agent and intermediary. If a TA is too busy to handle things like that, that is unfortunate. 2. In legal terms, "agent" means something very different from someone who pays for and can set parameters to a sailing. In terms of correcting personal info errors, even if it is RCCL's fault, an agent is someone who is legally authorized, through written or some acceptable form of verbal, consent. If you are an agent for your son-in-law and adult daughter, then something is truly off and RCCL is in the wrong. 3. I never meant to insinuate you were impersonating anyone. In fact, I don't think I even said that. The comment was in response to others suggesting it. Like I said, I am guilty of it too. 4. I think you misunderstand the terms "policy", "procedure", and "law." Nothing that a private company states is "law." Law is only imposed by recognized government institutions. Policy and procedure are contractual and sometimes binding terms that are like a law. In any event, if a company has a policy and procedure behind that policy, we shouldn't expect that any level of employee has authority to interpret those policies and procedures because if that were the case, a whole lot of misunderstandings would take place. A manager or senior management would have authority to interpret and implement. I stand by my opinion that when it comes to personal info information, RCCL was being prudent even if they made the initial mistake. Again, just because I paid for something on someone else's behalf, doesn't mean I am any type of agent or someone who can make unilateral decisions on behalf of that person. I can pay for my brother to have a surgery, but without written consent, I cannot tell the doctors what to do nor can I seek certain personal medical information.

Make reservations. Go for lunch. Go for dinner. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Caution: too much of a good thing, even GT, can be bad in the long run. My kids always tell me that they like going to a restaurant a couple of times, but beyond that, they don't want to risk ruining their first impressions especially for good restaurants. Me thinks me kids are wise.

Oh crap...you opened a can of worms that you cannot close now. Nothing's gonna stop [you] now....

The time you spent repeatedly making phone calls and such truly does suck, especially because it was administrative error on RCCL's part. On the other hand, and I ONLY SAY THIS AS AN OBSERVER, it give me peace of mind that RCCL sticks to its guns and follows protocol. Honestly, yeah...I have called places posing as my father or brother, lol even my wife, because I was in the position to take time and talk on the phone. BUT--I realized really quickly that over-the-phone verification does not require much info and it would be really, really, really easy for anyone to call and impersonate someone else. Simple place of birth, DOB, residence address info seemed to be enough in many cases. Regardless of our intent, and regardless of the familial connection, posing as someone else is fraud and may be criminal in most places. In the USA, posing as someone else while using the telephone elevates the crime to a federal crime (interstate commerce laws). Simply put, don't do it. I can stand proud and support a company that will stick to protocol for the safety of others, even if it made me mad as hell that they screwed up to begin with. P.S. Moral of this story should be....USE A TA. They have written consent to be your agent and could have had all of the above issues fixed at little to zero cost to you. RCCL pays TA's commissions, you don't.

Have done both, loved both. We would definitely do the Northstar again, and again. The Robot Bar was neat and I timed the drink making process from the time I pressed "order" to the time the drink was ready for pick up and it took 48 seconds or so. I was impressed.

I have not been on a cruise since last October or November. Is the food really that bad? I was a chef for an upscale Vegas restaurant for 1/4 of my life. I have had bad food, yes. But even as discerning as my palate is, I don't think I have generalized a restaurant's food to the point I would call the entire restaurant bad. For instance, I really hate Burger King. I don't think the food is that bad. Just don't think its good enough to go eat at. On the other end of the spectrum, we ate at the French Laundry a few years ago. I think with drinks it was $350 a person. I did not like one of the dishes at all. I can't even remember what it was, but I know I did not like it. a couple of other dishes were okay. the rest of the food was phenomenal. To each his/her own. I still would not generalize one way or another. On RCCL, there must hundreds upon hundreds of different dishes. Many of the dishes may be reimagined dishes from the same or similar ingredients as another, but still lots of variety. So is the food really bad enough to say "RC Food Suck"?

Yes. $35. We overfilled the plastic bag and they still didn't charge more or lose any items of clothing. I said this before about some other amenities such as the deluxe beverage package and the unlimited dining, but for us, the price we paid for those services included peace of mind and the feeling that we were being taken care of on vacation. For us, its vacation. I don't want to find a coin laundry at port and waste an hour doing my own laundry to save $30 or so. I know $30 can be a big deal to some, but for us, it meant that we got to spend that time doing something fun or relaxing. The clothes come back clean, folded better than how my kids or spouse would have done, and we didn't have to lift a finger. My wife, an accountant, always uses the cost of a movie as a bench mark. A movie ticket costs around $15 plus $15 for popcorn and drink. So for $30 a person, you get approximately 2 to 3 hours of entertainment at around $10 to $15 an hour. Let's say that you go to Disneyland and pay $150 for the ticket and $50 for food. Let's say you stay 10 hours. That comes to $20 an hour for a good time. By our metric, if we have to spend more than double the movie cost per hour of entertainment, its not worth it. An hour saved on laundry costs us around $9 an hour per person.

Anything and everything from Jamie's Italian. Been there 4 times on 2 different cruises. MDR - NY steak has been consistently good. Ask for rare. MDR - my spouse LOVED the sliced cranberry bread. It had some other things in it and was shaped like a ciabatta and sliced like normal white bread. It was very good. Windjammer - some sort of Caribbean stew with some kind of beef product. I can't remember any details but I ate it alot. Chops - Ribeye with Jus. Everything else is pale in comparison except for the Mushroom soup.

I swear my son had ramen at Izumi on the Ovation last year. I can't find pics though. As to ramen and udon stereotypes, I am uncertain that any of the aforementioned stereotypes that noodles are a cheap dish and not to be served with sushi is accurate. We just got back from 2 weeks in Japan. We had sushi at least 6 times. Out of those 6 times, udon or ramen was an option at 4 of those restaurants. Also, ramen was on average more expensive than Udon, and ramen was also on average more expensive than sushi. Even ramen at mom and pop shops. Just an FYI.

We took rain pants. WE found some extremely packable ones on Amazon. They rolled up to the size of a small water bottle. Just get a size larger and wear them over your regular pants. Take them off when needed. They dry extremely fast. Weather is a fickle thing up in Settle and Alaska. It poured rain 10 out of 12 days we were on our trip and 6 out of 7 days on the cruise. We walked and hiked quite a bit. So...for us, rain pants were worth it. Having said that, there are so many pants out there from so many different brands that use really good all-weather fabric. I am not sure what the description is, but I think something like utility pants? There are really nice gold pants from Under Armour that repel rain really well. These work double duty as light rain pants/ nice and comfortable regular pants. I also suggest these as they are also extremely packable an no iron needed.

Never been on Quantum, but Ovation is my favorite ship! They are the same class of ship and I don't think you will miss out much choosing one over the other. I will say though...Fish and Ships was fantastic! Especially if you go right when they open and all of the fried items are fresh!

Venting and ranting is one thing. Adults can do both. Doing it like a child (ie: throwing a tantrum using binary and absolutes like "I will never give Royal Carribean my business" based upon a whole lot of misconception, misunderstanding, and miseducation, and then running off....that just doesn't get my sympathy. How about this: Royal Cancelled My Cruise and I am Disappointed/Angry Blah, blah, yada, yada, can anyone convince me to give it another try and explain what options that I might have?

First, I enjoy your thoughtful comments. Whether I agree, they are well thought out and even-handed (mostly). I highlighted 3 things you said. 1. RCCL is a business. I am not making excuses for them. I also agree that our collective and aggregate input should, and sometimes does, shape RCCL policy. But the FACT of the matter is, its RCCL's business. Whether I, typing on a keyboard, in my pajamas, with moderate management experience, think I know better than RCCL, that is wholly irrelevant. It isn't my business, its RCCL's. I hate it, but that is reality. Apple, under Steve Jobs, was ruthless. They knew what they offered and stood firm. When antennae gate was all the rumble, Steve Jobs just said the customers shouldn't hold the phone that way instead of immediately appealing to the consumer. 2. Yes. Discuss. Even rant. Okay. That is different than what the OP and many others do. They throw a temper tantrum with zero objectivity, and leave. Sorry, no sympathy from me. 3. The way some people state it, and the words some people use may be inappropriate, but the reality is, like I mentioned before, this is a fan site, its 2023, Matt is transparent about this site not being affiliated with RCCL. Royal Caribbean Blog is an unofficial fan blog written for other fans of Royal Caribbean International. The Royal Caribbean Blog is not affiliated with Royal Caribbean International Now, what you and I are doing is intelligent, adult, healthy debate. It is robust. We are acknowledging one another. We are offering opinion, fact, and trying to be objective without being wholly unsubjective. This is productive. What the OP did was NOT productive.

the soy sauce thing is a little different in my opinion. In Japan, the sushi is simply amazing. Even the sushi sold at Costco Japan is good. The rice is flavored well and the amount of wasabi pre-applied is good. So in Japan, I never feel the need to add wasabi to soy sauce. In fact...some sushi is not meant to be dipped into soy sauce at all. And to top things off, only the fish is to be dipped into the soy sauce. Now...to get the kind of sushi I speak of above, you have to pay top dollar or find a sushi chef that really knows. So, here, in the States, I mix wasabi into my soy sauce to my heart's desire and dip like a mad man. Soy sauce on the fish. SOy sauce on the rice. Yum, yum, yum. Trust me when I say this, as a full blooded Asian, most sushi places outside of Japan have sushi chefs that are not likely Japanese or even Japan trained. So what do they care? I doubt the chefs at Izumi give 2 cents whether you mix, dip, or use a fork.

Amazon. Got 100 or more for $10 and we still have 50 after 2 cruises.

You give a fair opinion as to perspective and get points for morality and kindness from me. I do not disagree that maybe we were somewhat dismissive or harsh. Having said that, think about the following if you will: 1. More often than not, people who come to these boards and complain like the OP are one-offers. They come to rant and leave. They are not looking for empathy. 2. Empathy requires a person to understand and share in the feelings of the emoter. Many of us cannot do this because many of us understand a few things. A. RCCL is a business like all other cruise lines. B. This is 2023. We are in the information age and information (and unfortunately misinformation) is available 24/7 and literally at your finger tips. C. Many of us are prudent and do our homework to anticipate all sorts of crazy scenarios. D. This forum, and Matt in particular, advocates for using a travel agent. A TA would have been able to work something out or at the very least calm the OP down a little. 3. Did I mention that RCCL is a business? Right or Wrong, it is their business. We can certainly speak up and help shape future decisions such as cancelling a cruise in favor of a charter, but ultimately, they have a lot of information that they use and weigh to make these decisions and we simply do not. We can do a lot of guessing, but again, they are the cruise pros. 4. You suggest discussing the issues. We are. 5. People are crass by nature. A public forum, or semi-public forum, will have a lot of differing perspectives, but a fan forum will have more like-minded people than not. 6. MOST IMPORTANTLY, this is a FAN SITE.

I'm American born and bred Asian. Can't use chopsticks if my life depended upon it. I get the blunt of ridicule at every Asian restaurant I eat at. So you are in good company!

Not only is it acceptable to eat sushi with your hands, it is the traditional method to which sushi should be eaten. Now...obviously Izumi has non-sushi dishes such as ramen noodles and salads. If you eat those dishes with your hands, let the ridicule begin lol. Kidding....in what world does a Japanese restaurant (not otherwise located in Japan) only provide chopsticks? Ask for a fork. Enjoy your meal.